Full House: A Laid-Back Bay Area Mystery (The Jake Samson & Rosie Vicente Detective Series Book 3) (16 page)

Anyway, he was very tall and very thin, with healthy hazel eyes, lots of sandy hair, and freckles on his face and arms. He was wearing a yellow shirt with an alligator on it and white cotton pants. He was about my age.

“Okay,” he said, “what about Tom?”

“I assume you’ve heard that he’s disappeared?”

He stared at me. “What’s that mean?”

“It means that nobody seems to know where he is. Unless you do.”

He raised his hands helplessly. “Tell me more.” This man was good at saying nothing and getting someone else to dump everything he knows.

I told him about the dear June letter. He shook his head.

“Hard to tell what that might mean.”

“What about Marjorie?” Rosie asked. “Do you know anything about any relationship he might have with her?”

“Even if I did, and I don’t, that’s not the kind of thing I’d involve myself in.” He softened his answer, smiling at Rosie again. This was, undoubtedly, supposed to make us veer off. It didn’t work. I can’t stand self-righteous twerps who claim to have no normal curiosity.

“Have you ever met Marjorie?” Rosie asked. He was silent for a moment. Then he decided to own up.

“Sure. She did some work for Tom from time to time. Good businesswoman.”

“She was up here recently,” I said. “What do you know about that?”

“Recently? When would that have been?”

I told him.

He flipped back some pages on his desk calendar. I wanted to scrape the freckles off his face.

“Yes,” he said finally. “She was here.”

Through clenched jaws, I said, “Why don’t you tell me about it?”

He shrugged. “She was here. To see me.” He leaned back in his chair a little, and with every appearance of frankness and innocence, he added, “Business.”

“What kind of business?”

He looked irritated. “Just business… Samson, is it?”

“Secret business?”

“None-of-your-business business.”

Rosie stepped in. “Was she by herself, or was Gerhart with her?”

“She was alone.”

“What day was that?”

He glanced again at his calendar. “Sunday the fifteenth, I believe.” That was the day Noah’s mechanic said he’d called him from Tahoe.

“You sure you didn’t see Gerhart?”

“I didn’t see him.” It was my turn to gaze at him, but his eyes didn’t waver.

“How did she seem?” I asked.

“You mean, did she seem like a woman who had just run off with her lover?” I didn’t answer. “She seemed like a woman who was up here to take care of some business for her employer.”

“Did she say anything about when she was returning to the Bay Area, or if she was returning, or if she was on her way somewhere else, or where she last saw Gerhart, or when?”

He looked slightly amused at my irritation. “No.”

“Did she say where she was staying?”

He looked me firmly in the eye. “No.”

“You were in business together,” Rosie said, “but now he’s disappeared. Where does that leave you?”

He thought about it. “I don’t know that he’s really disappeared, do I?”

“No, he could be dead.” Rosie suggested.

Pincus looked at her, shocked. “That wasn’t what I meant. Maybe he has run off for some reason, but I’ll hear from him sooner or later.”

“What if you don’t?” I barked.

He smiled sweetly and shrugged.

“What kind of agreement do you have about his shares? If he’s dead, who gets them?”

“His wife.” He sat forward in his chair, elbows on desk, chin on interlocked fingers, and looked first at Rosie, then at me. “Are you trying to get at something?”

“Yes,” I told him. “I’m trying to find out if you had any reason to kill the man.”

He looked perplexed. “Who said anything about killing?”

“Or,” I continued, “if you had any need for the money that seems to have disappeared with him.”

He looked interested. “How much money was that?” I told him. He laughed. “I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have a need for a quarter of a million dollars.”

“But maybe you have a particular need for it. Business problems?”

“Hell no. This is a good business. Maybe you noticed on your way up here.”

“Why won’t you talk about what Marjorie was doing here, Pincus,” I shot back at him. “What are you hiding?”

He stood up. First he spoke to Rosie. “Excuse me,” he said. Then he turned to me. “I don’t know who you are, Samson, and I don’t know what you’re doing here—”

“I told you. We’re working for Arnold Wolfe and we’re looking for—”

“—And I don’t care what your story is. I’d like to see you get your ass out of my office. But feel free to come back anytime you want that ass whipped.”

“I hope you’re including me in that threat,” Rosie said. He ignored her, and continued to stare at me.

There are several ways to deal with threats. I decided to back off for the moment with one of my own.

Graciously, smiling a dangerous smile, I told him, “We’ll be around, and we’ll be back. You shouldn’t have threatened me, Pincus. Now I’m pissed off.”

Rosie and I stood up, cool.

“I’m sorry to hear you’re coming back,” he said, taking his seat again. “I wouldn’t recommend it. But I’ll be here all evening.” He smiled. I smiled. We left.

“Really gets the old adrenaline going, doesn’t it, Rosie? I bet it’s going to be a good ten minutes before I can choke down my dinner.”

“I’ll need fifteen.”

We decided against the eat-all-you-want casino buffets. They’re a great buy if you can stuff yourself until you’re sick and not eat for two days afterward. But that doesn’t work for me. If I eat too much at night, I just want to eat too much in the morning. We went to a place I knew. Continental. It had been two years, but the restaurant looked and smelled the same. Rosie opened with escargot, I ordered blue points. I used to like escargot, back when I lived in the Midwest and had never met a living snail. I just don’t feel the same about them any more.

Rosie took a walk to the ladies’. I thought about Jerry Pincus. I remembered guys like him from high school. They never had names like Jacob or Marvin. They were often named Jerry. I gave this Jerry a probable life story. His father owned a car dealership. The family had a big house in a prewar section of a close-in suburb. He probably had a younger sister who worshipped him and fell in love with his friends. He played basketball. He wasn’t particularly witty or intelligent or terrific-looking, but the teenage girls who were closest to their instincts liked him a lot. It had to do with survival and reproduction. They knew he would do well in the world they understood. He seemed to know about money and psyching out the other guy and when to make a move and when to slip sideways and when to take a chance and when to dig in. He knew about those things in the same way that some people understand color and form and design.

And because he was close to his instincts in the same way those girls were, he would choose one of them: beautiful, bright enough to raise the children but not bright enough to get bored with him and their life. She would create a home and enhance his prestige. He would create money and security and maybe even a dynasty. These people find each other, and neither one is ever tempted to wander off in search of self, or truth, or anything else. They seem to be born with the practical wisdom that never leads to adventure or art, or the real, ugly danger of life on the outside.

Oh, sure, occasionally a Jerry will make a mistake. He’ll marry someone with flawed genes who, after a decade or so, starts drinking or screwing around. Or he’ll get caught cheating on his income taxes.

But those are the exceptions. Most Jerrys lead safe, satisfied lives. More power to them, I suppose. Am I jealous? Probably.

Rosie came back. The rest of dinner arrived, her tournedos and my trout.

“What do you think, Jake? Did he see Noah? Did he know he was up here?”

“Maybe. Then again, maybe Noah didn’t want Pincus to know he was in town for some reason.”

“Why would he do that? Because he was having an affair with Marjorie?”

I shook my head. That wasn’t it. “No. I think Pincus could be trusted with that information. Like he said, it’s not the kind of thing he involves himself in.”

“I don’t like him. I think he could kill someone.”

“I don’t know.” I told her about the Jerrys.

“That’s ridiculous,” she laughed. “The man owns a casino, for God’s sake. Is that the kind of thing a Jerry would do?”

“Sure. It’s not so different from running a car dealership, and probably more profitable.”

She looked doubtful. “I guess. But how would I know? I grew up with grapes. I didn’t know any Jerrys.”

We rejected the dessert cart and found our next stop on the map. The Bon Chance Motel.

It looked like most of the other small motels in Tahoe, built ugly in the early fifties but broken-in and comfortable-looking.

The woman in the office was friendly, and expressed regret that she had no vacancies. She had blue hair.

“Actually,” Rosie said, “we’re looking for information.”

“Oh?” Polite but doubtful.

“We have reason to believe that a friend of ours stayed at this motel a week or so ago. Two friends, really, but the one we’re particularly interested in finding, well… her mother is dying, and…” Nice work, Rosie, I thought.

“Oh, dear,” the woman said. “And you don’t know where she is?”

“That’s right.” I pulled out the pictures of Marjorie and Noah. She recognized them immediately.

“Yes, a really beautiful girl. Of course I remember her. She and the older man. They came in together. I remember because the man had some trouble with his car while they were here. I recommended a mechanic in town. But they only stayed a few days, and then they checked out.”

“I wonder if you could tell me when they checked in and when they left. That will give me some idea…” I faltered.

“Oh, I think I could do that. I don’t remember the names, though.”

Since I didn’t know what name Noah might have been using, I gave her the name Marjorie had given the mechanic.

She looked through her book, and found it. “Here it is. Beatrice Hinks, room 20, September 14th. Actually, she registered for both of them, late that evening.”

“Registered?” Rosie asked. “With ID?”

“Well, yes. A driver’s license. And she paid for both of them when she checked out. In cash.

“He’d already gone. You see, He turned in his key on”— she glanced down at the book— ”Wednesday night.”

“And she left when?” Rosie again.

“Thursday morning. And you know, I think there was some kind of problem, because when I told her he had turned in the key to his room, she looked upset.” The woman was enjoying the drama a bit too much.

“His room?” I thought this might be an interesting point.

“Oh, yes. They had adjoining rooms. He was in 21.” She leaned confidentially across the counter. “But even so, I think there might have been some kind of triangle going on there.”

We waited.

“You see, not long after she learned that he had gone, another man came to see her in her room.” She lowered her voice. “I heard them shouting at each other.”

“Did you hear what they were shouting?” I asked.

“All I heard was the word Sonoma,” she said regretfully.

“If we knew who that man was,” I mused, “it would give us some idea of where she might have gone. Do you remember anything about him? He might be someone we know.”

She gave us a very good description of Jerry Pincus.

“One more thing,” I said. “Did the man she came here with take his car or leave it for her?”

“He took it. She asked me about rentals when I told her he was gone.”

“Did she leave with the second man?” Rosie wanted to know.

“No, she didn’t. I think they were angry with each other. Right after I heard them shouting, that was when I saw him. He walked across the lot, got into his car, and drove away. She left oh, maybe half an hour later. But I can’t be exactly sure, of course.”

“Thank you for all your help,” I said.

“No trouble at all.” I caught a slightly malicious gleam in her eye. “I hope you find your friend in time.”

Pincus wasn’t in his office. I looked at my watch. Ten o’clock. But he’d said he’d be there all evening and I believed him. We got a couple of beers from the downstairs bar, bought some nickels, and sat down at a pair of slots, taking turns keeping our eyes on the door to his cubicle.

After about fifteen minutes, I was breaking even, Rosie was down a dollar, and we saw Pincus walk up to the door, unlock it, and close himself inside. We followed him.

This time I didn’t knock. I just turned the knob and walked in. He looked up, startled, saw me, with Rosie an inch behind, and shook his head in disgust.

“Turn around and go right back out again, Samson.” He picked up some papers and pretended to read them.

“Then I can stay?” Rosie asked.

He sighed and shook his head again. “Both of you. Out. I’m a busy man.”

“We know that,” I said. I sat down. Rosie sat down. I put my elbows on his desk and made myself at home. “But I’m sure you wouldn’t want any trouble in your casino.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I wouldn’t mind.” But he leaned back in his chair and added, “You’ve got thirty seconds.”

“Sorry. That’s not enough. You’ve had a few hours since we were here before. You’ve had time to check on me. Isn’t it funny that you still don’t want to help?” It occurred to me suddenly that I hadn’t been able to reach Arnold. Maybe nobody was home? But Pincus didn’t bother to give me any excuses. He just shrugged and looked at his watch. I was trying to read him, trying to figure out how long he’d sit still before he called a bouncer. No luck.

“You lied to us, Pincus. You know damned well Noah was up here with Marjorie. Maybe they’re still up here. You know why. I want some truth from you right now, because I’m going to find them with or without your help, but when it’s all over, you’re going to wish you hadn’t been such a prick.”

“You’re an asshole, Samson. Even an animal knows when he’s on someone else’s territory, and knows how to act.”

I stood up and leaned over his desk. “Your partner has disappeared. So has Marjorie Burns. A bunch of people back in the Bay Area think there’s cause to worry, that they’re in trouble. You know what’s going on. They came here for a reason, and you’re the only reason I know of in Tahoe. I don’t think they came here to play poker or see the shows. You were seen at their motel the morning after he left, and you were having a fight with Marjorie. You want to talk to me or you want to talk to the cops?” It was a bluff and he acted like he knew it.